From the news desk

Minstrel association struggles with carnival funding

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All monies received from the City of Cape Town for the fund
ing of the Cape Minstrel’s Carnival will go into the organisation and planning of the annual showpiece, the Cape Town Minstrels Carnival Association (CTMCA) has assured. 2015 marks the second consecutive year the popular end-of-year event will be organised by the association, having previously been under the control of the City. The City of Cape Town however still allocates a reasonable amount of funding towards the minstrel industry’s hosting of the carnival.

The association has already faced prior inquiries over the manner in which it used just over R40 million’s worth of funding from the National Lotteries Distribution Trust Fund (NLDTF). The complaint was lodged to the Office of the Public Protector in March by the City.

CTMCA CEO Kevin Momberg stressed that none of the funds received from the City would be given to any of the captains of the respective minstrel groups, despite the time, money and effort they were putting in to adequately prepare their teams.

“They are transporting their people, giving them food and giving them a place to practice…What happens though is that this money will all go towards services like the traffic (officials), metro police, medics and those types of things,” he stated.

Momberg said the Public Protector’s investigation put the CTMCA in a bad light, despite them having submitted an audit report on the use of the funds. As a result, acquiring the necessary funding to host this year’s event was proving a challenge.

“Our corporate friends and even the service providers, we are struggling to build a relationship with them to tell them that we need fencing, we need toilets and those types of things, all because of the ugly scrap we had (with the City),” he admitted.

Momberg said it would take a lot of time and effort on the part of the CTMCA to try and re-establish and repair its relationship with corporates and groups who were financially supporting them.

He further suggested that the fact the City were again allocating funds for the event proved that nothing had been found wrong with the usage of the 2014 funds.

The City of Cape Town said it received requests for financial support from eight minstrel associations.

“We received eight individual applications for various minstrel, Malay choir and Christmas band activities for the 2015/16 season. The total available funding for all eight of these event applications is R3,65 million which was approved by Council in May 2015,” said the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Tourism, Events and Economic Development, Councillor Garreth Bloor.

In light of the applicable legislation which governs the conditions for the events, the City has urged all organisations to declare whether they are compliant with the conditions as stipulated in their correspondence. Should the conditions not be met, or should an organisation fail to declare their compliance, funding will not be allocated to the successful applicant.

“This event is an intrinsic part of the cultural fabric of our city and we would like to see it even better managed and implemented this season. Our role is to assist in producing a minstrel’s event that attracts visitors and tourists in large numbers. I wish to record the City’s continued support for the minstrels and this annual event which is synonymous with Cape Town,” added Councillor Bloor.

Momberg said the association would be continuing discussions with the City, and were hopeful that there would be little hiccups in the hosting of the event this year. VOC


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2 comments

  1. All Cape Muslims especially the Cape Muslims of the Bo-Kaap must organise must organize Mosque collections to preserve and save the culture of Coon/Minstrels.This Coon culture was brought by our forefathers to the Southern tip of Africa The Cape of Storms that came from India (25% Indian slaves came from India Prof Robert Shell’s book Children of Bondage) also Indonesia.Our forefathers loved to sing the American anthem “Daar kom die Alabama” and stand attention to it even today.
    Richard “Pot” Stemmet of the Pennsylvanians (which incidently is a state in Indonesia) is the hero and icon of every Cape Muslim youth of the Cape Flats.
    We Cape Muslims of the Bo-Kaap has been given the permission to all COON/Minstrels have back to back marches and practise runs on Friday,Saturday and Sunday nights until the early hours of these days before the biggest Coon/Minstrels spectable of the Tweede Nuwe Jaar Carnival 2016.This practise events can be used to have food stalls in Wale street,Rose street and Chiappini street.

  2. Re: “This event is an intrinsic part of the cultural fabric of our city…”
    I shall take that statement from whence it comes!

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